The 1960's were a magical time in the world of creative advertising.
This is a time when such "adult" things as cigarettes and beer were staples in commercial campaigns
The beer commercials were especially clever, using elements evocative of classic themes as Spy movies, adventure film, and a never ending variety of beautiful women.
One such genius advertising campaigns was for Falstaff Beer.
This series that ran in the early and mid 60's, feature legendary Gorilla Man, George Barrows as a cuddly beer swilling simian , who for all appearances is the boyfriend of a cute brunette, in a variety of themes and settings.
So for your viewing pleasure, I give you ...Falstaff Beer ! Gorilla approved...Gorilla guzzled !
Now if you'll excuse me...I'm going to pop a cold one !
( a special thanks to the gang at Ape Suit Cinema for helping procure these !)
Hiya my manic monkey man minions !
Another behinds the scenes treat for all us George Barrows fans !
This one comes from my big gorilla brother Bob Burns. Bob was thrilled to see the last post about old George and he immediately let me know that George had given him something similar to the diagrams last time.
So, if you you're ready for more, (and I know you are !) this is how George put ALL that hair on his incredible suit !
You've probably heard us refer to "hand tied, or ventilated hair" before, and this is how to do it Barrows style !
Old Bob also included a great behind the scenes shot of George getting suited up.
So through the generosity of Bob Burns, enjoy everyone !
tail of our study of Crash Corrigan's mechanical armature from White Pongo, we get another really cool one for ya !
George Barrows was one of the most identifiable gorilla faces ever.
A giant hulking beast, with a very distinctive sagital crest (pointy head, for the uninitiated )
And gigantic, quasi comical mouth.
George was very prolific in the 50's, 60's, and 70's and was featured in a ton of TV productions.
George had feature parts in shows like "The Man from U.N.C.L.E.", " The Beverly Hillbilly's" and perhaps his most beloved role, as Gorgo the gorilla in the classic comedy "the Addams Family" !
Barrows' also had a fantastic movie career as well, co-starring in Classics like "Ghost in the Invisible Bikini", Hillbilly's in a Haunted House " The black Zoo" and my favorite, "Gorilla at Large "!
George donned a space helmet, instead of his gorilla noggin to star in the notorious "Robot Monster "!
There is however one movie that is credited to George Barrows that he never appeared in, and that would be "Konga".
Rather than playing the title role himself, he was talked into renting his phenomenal suit to to the British production and shipped his suit to England. When the suit arrived back in the States, George was devastated !
The English stuntman that wore the suit, nearly destroyed it. He had cut holes in the hand tied fur suit, to add ventilation, and had broken the mechanism that drew back the lips into a fierce snarl.
Needless to say, after the suit was repaired, the suit was never rented again.
Now enter a young lad from the bayou state of Louisiana.
Young George Phillips developed a fondness for the work of Mr. Barrows that grew into full on fandom. Barrows became a hero to young George Phillips, and the younger George took an interest in becoming a mighty gorilla man, like his idol.
Being a resourceful youngster , George got a hold of Barrows address and decided to write him a letter, asking the older George how to go about making a gorilla suit like the one Mr. Barrows wore.
With the highest of hopes, into the mail it went. Now this was way back when communication of this sort comprised of taking a pencil, and actually writing your thoughts down on paper.
Unlike the lighting fast advent of email, the mail at the time could take days, to even weeks till you would get a response.
Then there was also the added worry, that maybe a busy Hollywood type would find no time for a letter from a kid.
After waiting for a seeming eternity, a letter finally arrived in young George Phillips' mailbox.
Expecting a short note of some sort, young George was delighted beyond words, to find that the elder George have not only responded, but had taken the time to meticulously spell out each and every step of the process for creating a gorilla suit like his own. Not only were the steps, discussed in detail, but Mr. Barrows had taken the time to fully diagram many of the steps with hand drawn illustrations !
George Phillips is a friend of mine through the Ape Suit Cinema board on Facebook, and I very much value that friendship.
George was very generous is providing hi resolution scans of George Barrows actual letters sent to him as a young man, and we now present them here.
A huge thanks to my friend George Phillips for his generosity !
Thank you so much once again George !
But that's not all !
As an added bonus, my dear friend, the legendary Bob Burns has delved into his incredible archives of photos and come up with 2 fantastic photos of the workshop where George Barrows created his amazing suit !...How cool is that !
This is George Barrrows' suit as it appears today.
These photos were taken by Tom Woodruff Jr. and Bob Burns at the Los Angeles Museum of Science.
Barrows donated the suit to the museum at the time of his passing.
There ya have it kids, the official in and outs of the creation of one of the greatest gorillas in movie history !
After several requests from members (thanks Mark and DonHo57) prompted a historical search of this humble blog, I came to find that one of the greats of gorilla movies had gone uncovered.
Gorilla at Large is truly an important moment in simian cinema, and in 3-D yet !!!
The film is chock full of some of the great actors and character actors of the 50's,
including a VERY young, Lee Marvin as a cop who is a thorough imbecile.
Gorilla at Large (GAL) stars Raymond Burr, Cameron Mitchell, and a scorching hot Anne Bancroft.
The supporting cast features the great Lee J. Cobb, Charlotte Austin, and Warren Stevens.
The film takes place in a travelling carnival, featuring a trapeze act with Anne Bancroft
swinging over the enclosure of the savage gorilla Goliath ! ( George Barrows).
The carnival owner (Burr) plans to spice up the act by having her fall and be caught by Goliath...
Or so it would seem. Enter Cameron Mitchell as a carnival worker chosen to substitute for Goliath while the lights are dimmed during the show.
Of note here, is the gorilla costume worn by Mitchell was a rental costume manufactured by the famous Western Costume of Hollywood.
This rental suit was actually used as real gorillas in very low budget potboilers in the 40's and 50's,
but it looked painfully pathetic next to George Barrows amazing suit !
This was a long standing gag in Hollywood, to feature an actor who wears crappy gorilla suit,
to be mistaken for a real gorilla ( pro Gorilla Man !)
The obvious difference in quality between the suits helps to sell the idea that the pro Gorilla Man is indeed a real ( reel) gorilla. Many times this is used to comedic effect, but here it is used for high drama.
It seems that a slimy carnival worker who was blackmailing the owner ( Burr) winds up murdered in Goliaths cage.
At first it appears that Goliath may have killed the blackmailer, but police investigator Lee J. Cobb isn't convinced.
He looks toward Mitchell as a suspect due to the fact that, he dresses like a gorilla ! ( of course)
Suspicions then spread from person to person when subplots are introduced involving Burr, Bancroft, and Bancroft's hulking ex-husband, and Goliath's keeper Kovacs. ( Peter Whitney )
To further ad to the fun, Goliath escapes from his enclosure and begins rampaging through the carnival.
It wouldn't be a true gorilla man classic if the beastie didn't grab up a beautiful girl and go climb something, and GAL does not disappoint !
An interesting thing to look for,( and at times fairly obvious), is the use of a light weight rubber replica of Anne Bancroft for Barrows to lug around.
As a guy who wears a gorilla suit, I can tell you from experience, that being a gorilla man is brutally hard work ! My suit weighs a little over 45 lbs, but George's colossal suit weighed nearly 60 !
Just moving effectively with that amount of weight is hard enough, but you also are usually well over
100 degrees hot inside, and you can't really get adequate airflow in the mask.
Now after your nearly dead from just wearing the suit, you have to act...usually with a lot of action and energy. Now to finish you off, we need you to carry a 130lb woman and climb up a roller coaster with her in your arms. It sounds like the tortures of the damned, but it all in a days work for a gorilla man !
Back to the movie, George Barrows does carry the lovely Miss Bancroft around, as well as her rubber duplicate for the more dangerous scenes. What those scenes are, I won't tell as I don't want to spoil the fun.
Needless to say, Gorilla at Large is a really fun movie with fantastic 3-D effects !
Awe come on lady...My back is killing me !
You've got lo love the effects of gravity !
Camron Mitchell attacks !
Watch those paws Cameron !
Does this big ape take care of the gorilla ?
Holy crap ! Lee Marvin !
A very cool scene in 3-D !!!
Beware of gorillas in submarines !
Another great shot when seen in 3-D !!!
Here for you, my monkey minions, are a slew of screen caps I hand selected for you as well as some incredible promo shots from the collection of Bob Burns !
And when you get a chance , Be sure and watch Gorilla at Large ! and don't forget your 3-D glasses !
The great George Barrows shows up for more hairy hi-jinx on the not so classic series Date with the Angels.
The series starred Betty White as Vickie Angel and Bill Williams as Gus Angel .
The stories revolved around the newlywed Angels, and their day to day adventures in their all-American middle class neighborhood.
In this episode, the Angels return home from vacation to find a stuffed gorilla in their bedroom,
victims of Gus's practical joking co-workers at his insurance offices.
Gus decides to up the ante by hiring gorilla impersonator, Mr.Kelly (George Barrows).
Needless to say, all doesn't go quite as planned, and hilarity ensues....well , OK, maybe not hilarity exactly, more like a few chuckles, but you get the idea.
George really gets to show his comedy skills here and you get to see a lot of him with the mask off !
Truly a rare treat if ever there were one !
Date with the Angels ran from 1957-58, and lasted a 33 episodes.
Uncle agent Napolean Solo about to get one heck of a surprise , in the classic Man from U.N.C.L.E. episode, "The My Friend The Gorilla Affair".
The episode features big George Barrows as a gorilla named "Baby".
The episode also features the stunning Vitina Marcus as the jungle girl that Baby protects.
Ms. Marcus's most famous role is "Athena", the Girl from the Green Dimension from "Lost in Space ". You get to see George's gorilla suit quite well in this episode, as all his scenes were in full light. You can see all the fantastic detail George built into his incredible suit.
George Barrows was one of the most memorable gorilla men ever. His suit was instantly recognisable in any film or TV show he ever appeared in.
This is how RO-MAN's helmet appears in "Phanom from Space "
Help ! You gotta be pretty horned up, not to notice that standing behind you ! Bob Burns and friend, from Robot Monster, the Special Edition ! Modern gorilla man Tom Woodruff, getting "bubbled" by Joe Dante, from"Looney Toons, Back In Action "!
Wow, what can you say about this "classic" that hasn't been said already. For a long time this flick has been fodder for the Golden Turkey Awards, Mystery Science Theatre, and countless blogs and websites who are perfectly content on ripping it to shreds.
The budget constraints are legendary as this production was so tight on it's budget that the couldn't afford to build, ( or even rent) a suitable robot costume. Enter George Barrows, who with his gorilla suit provided the "Monster" part of the title. Now came the hard part, the "Robot" part of the equation.
The helmet, which is now part of our old friend Bob Burns' collection, has an interesting side note, the same helmet was also used in the film "Phantom from Space". Both films were released in 1953, and the primary difference in appearance is the fact that they used it facing opposite directions ! "Phantom" had the little air tanks in front, While "Robot Monster" had them in back.
The face plate ( hole) for robot monster was enlarged to be a rather large circle, where in "Phantom it had only a narrow side-ways oval shape . Add a set of 50's television antennae and voila' , Robot Monster !
George Barrows turns in one of his greatest performances as RO-MAN, evil invader. Rather than surrounding himself in a cloud of awesome evil, he instead surrounds himself with a cloud of happy bubbles! ( brought to you courtesy of N.A.Fischer Chemical Products, "Billion Bubble Machine ! ) And yes, the bubble thingee actually got screen credit !
The story is a rather dismal post apocalyptic , invasion story. The entire population of the Earth (except for 5 people) have been wiped out by RO-MAN, and his mysterious ray device. The 5 survivors are hiding is a basement to a house that had been blasted apart. With no roof over them, they still manage to hide from RO-MAN, even though the are like less than a mile from each other. RO-MAN's boss, THE SUPREME GUIDANCE, orders RO-MAN to finish off those pesky HU-MANS once and for all.
After launching brutal attacks with fearsome giant reptiles (stock footage from old dinosaur movies) to no avail ,RO-MAN then decides to take matters into his own hands and proceeds to throttle the life out of any one of our heroes he is lucky enough to find alone. Even the little boy ! What a dirty S.O.B.!
As fate would have it, the plan runs into a snag when RO-MAN is ordered to dispatch the one thing that is like Kryptonite to all gorillas, and gorilla robot invaders. The hot chick !
See : RO-MAN fall in love! - See RO-MAN tie her up and tear her blouse off ! - See RO_MAN get his ass handed to him by the SUPREME GUIDANCE !
WOW! What a movie !
The Character of RO-MAN has been performed not only by George Barrows, but also by Bob Burns in "Robot Monster the special edition ", and most recently by modern gorilla man Tom Woodruff in Joe Dante's "Looney Tunes Back in Action".
Where will fate take RO-MAN next ? No one knows for sure !
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Uncle agent Napolean Solo about to get one heck of a surprise , in the classic Man from U.N.C.L.E. episode, "The My Friend The Gorilla Affair".
You get to see George's gorilla suit quite well in this episode, as all his scenes were in full light. You can see all the fantastic detail George built into his incredible suit.
George Barrows as the Supreme Guidance !
This is how RO-MAN's helmet appears in "Phanom from Space "
Help !
You gotta be pretty horned up, not to notice that standing behind you !
Bob Burns and friend, from Robot Monster, the Special Edition !
Modern gorilla man Tom Woodruff, getting "bubbled" by Joe Dante, from"Looney Toons, Back In Action "!
